


Neither Up Nor Down

by Zilentdreamer



Category: Labyrinth (1986)
Genre: Depression, Gen, Magic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-27
Updated: 2012-07-27
Packaged: 2017-11-10 19:54:04
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 655
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/470046
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zilentdreamer/pseuds/Zilentdreamer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Nothing was the same.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Neither Up Nor Down

Nothing was the same.

Hands clenched at her sides, Sarah turned in a slow circle. Everything looked the same. She had been coming to this park for as long as she could remember. Nothing had changed, and yet everything was different.

Sarah couldn't pinpoint it at first. It was a subtle feeling, more an implied sensation of 'wrongness'. Looking around, there were no glaring declarations of change. The bench Merlin had sat on that afternoon so long ago was still there. The trees were just beginning to shed their leaves, following the silent prompting of fall. Out of the corner of her eye she could see joggers and bikers make their way across the small bridge spanning the lake that was the park's life blood.

Feeling lost and out of touch, she gingerly seated herself on the stone bench. The chill that clung to the pale stone seeped through her jeans, and she shivered, drawing her arms around her middle. It was unnerving how alien this place seemed. It was as if her time Underground had irrevocably changed how she viewed the Aboveground.

Sarah's breath caught in her throat as she realized just how she had referred to her world. Only it wasn't _her_ world anymore. Now it was one of two worlds, and the Aboveground could not begin to match the depth of its twin. Ensnared by the comparison of the two, Sarah's mind brought up the image of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. They were one in the same, only with two very different faces that were bound by magic. One was the monster, only Sarah couldn't decide which of the two worlds held the heart of darkness.

The grass, where before it had been lush and vivid, was now dull and brittle beneath her feet. The sky was bland; the blue was faded and worn by the passage of time and life it self. The orange and yellow leaves were rotting at the base of their parent trees, the musky scent overwhelming the flowers that struggled nearby.

When compared to the warm wind of Underground, the sharp, biting cold of Aboveground was unbearable. The air from Underground filled her lungs and tingled with every breath. She saw clearer down there, the sounds were sharper, and the tastes more intense. The lush taste of a peach still danced across her tongue, there and gone with every breath. The cold wind of Aboveground reminded Sarah more of the cold touch of metal at the nape of her neck.

The Underground had revealed to her the pitfalls of dreams gone rogue and horrible wishes whispered in a dark room. It had turned stable reality into a pitfall of treachery and leering shadows. It had done all this, and it was the World Above that left her trembling and fearful.

The deep rolling chimes of a clock reached her, and she started, her mind flashing back to a clock that bore thirteen numbers instead of twelve. She looked to the distant clock tower where her gaze was drawn to the elegant hands that marked the time. She had never stopped to consider the clock tower before. That it looked strange without the number thirteen reigning high over the other numbers was just another sign of how much things had changed.

How Jareth would laugh if he saw her now. She may have managed to deny him in the end with her words, but Sarah realized that in the end he had won. She got her brother, but he had stolen her whole world.

Shivering from an abrupt gust of icy wind, Sarah curled in on her self and closed her eyes, her forehead pressed against her knees. Her long hair fell around her legs as she saw not the drab world that was her sanctuary turned prison, but the sparkling world of magic and fire orange skies that was her nightmare turned fantasy.

Such a pity.


End file.
